280 Mr Forbes's Physical Notices of the Bay of Naples. 



and the other near the Castle of Baja. * These speak un- 

 answerably. The mole, too, which exists at the port of Poz- 

 zuoli, and is commonly called that of Caligula, has the water 

 up to a considerable height of the arches, whereas, as Breis- 

 lak justly observes,"f it is next to certain that the piers must 

 formerly have reached the surface before the arches sprung. 

 Nor are these effects so local as some would have us to believe, 

 for on the opposite side of the bay of Naples, on the Sorren- 

 tine coast, which, as well as Pozzuoli, is very subject to earth- 

 quakes, a road with some fragments of Roman building is 

 covered to some depth by the sea. J It is also certain that 

 in the island of Capri, which is situated some way at sea in 

 the opening of the bay of Naples, one of the palaces of Tibe- 

 rius is now partly covered with water. § So much, then, for 

 the argument of a real depression of the land in this neigh- 

 bourhood. 



In the second place, we may show that the temporary ele- 

 vation of the land or depression of the sea level, which took 

 place for a period of not less than half a century, between 

 the time of Septimius Severus and the present, was not of that 

 purely local nature which the supposition of a salt lake would 

 make it. As the most indisputable proof, not only are there 

 marine depositions mixed with the volcanic strata at the foot of 

 the Monte Nuovo, but there is a fragment of building at the 

 same place, where shells are found in small cavities in the stone, 

 at the height of six feet above the sea, and being larger than the 

 entrances of the holes in which they lodge, it is obvious that, 

 just as in the case of the Mytili at the temple of Serapis, the 

 animals must have increased in size within the cells during the 

 continuance of the sea at that level. This observation was 

 made by Pini, || the very man who supports the lacustrine 

 theory, which it is so completely calculated to overthrow. 



If we choose to generalize our views a little, we shall find 



• Represented in the curious old map by Capaccio. 

 + Campanie, ii. 162. note. 

 t Starke. 



§ See the Map in Hadrava's '* Lettere sopra I'isola di Capri" — Dresda, 

 4to, and Breislak, i. 48. 

 jl On the authority of Breislak, who accompanied him. 



